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More than that, by voting for Santorum, you help remove a barrier between him and the Whitehouse. If he wins the primary, and then goes on to defeat Obama, you will be responsible. In the event that Santorum wins the general election, you will get everything you deserve. Sadly, the rest of us will as well.

Santorum will get absolutely demolished in the general election. I can't imagine him doing better than Kerry against Bush, and I can easily imagine him doing much worse.

Democrats who like Obama should throw in for Santorum. The moment Romney gets this primary sewn up is the moment he goes back to being vaguely liberal and usually reasonable, and therefore, a tougher opponent for Obama.

Agreed.. I would love to see Obama go further left to counter Paul when the issue of foreign aggression or the war on drugs comes up...

If Obama had to go further left rather than right to win that would be a win for a lot of people. The other 3 candidates will only push him to the right which keeps wars on the table, marijuana as a dangerous drug with no medical uses etc...

He never said that he would legalize weed, though he said he would stop using federal agencies to bust medicinal marijuana dispensaries in states that allowed the sale of medicinal marijuana. As we all know, this was a bunch of bullshit.

Yeah, he never said he would legalize it. He actually explicitly stated that he was not for legalization. BUT he clearly stated in 2004 that we should "strongly reconsider how we approach the war on drugs" and we "should decriminalize our marijuana laws.

People on reddit have a too high opinion of debates. They're rehearsed pander-fests, not intellectual smackdowns.

And honestly, I have no reason to think that a Paul v Obama debate would be any different than traditional debates. Paul would be consistant and say the same things that he has in the last 20 debates, Obama would defend his record and poke at Paul for seeming too far out of the mainstream.

PPP is indicating a kind of late re-surge for Santorum in Michigan right now. He was -2 to Romney in their Sunday only sample but +1 in the poll release today.

Arizona is winner take all and Romney is favored there, although it's a game of expectations there, and the other candidates will benefit if they can post strong showings or beat the polling.

Michigan's primary OTOH is a hybrid that awards 2 delegates per Congressional District and 2 for the overall winner of the vote. Nate Silver from fivethirtyeight has a rundown of who is favored to win which district.

Santorum winning Michigan will give him a lot of support that will be crucial for him on Super Tuesday next week. Something important to note is that the Washington caucus is on Saturday, and with only 3 days' worth of coverage until that contest, a Santorum win in Michigan will directly translate to potentially a double digit lead in Washington, where he was already leading in polls. On the flip side, a Romney win in Michigan would have the appearance of decisively shifting momentum in his favor to snowball his way through Super Tuesday.

When you think about it Romney has blown a free pass to the presidency. He has the looks that would cast him for president in a movie.He has money, connections and great press. But he inherited his dads faulty wiring. They did not filter out what they said before they said it Nor were they able to put themselves in the position of the audience. The people was left wondering how dumb or how far out of touch ,they really are. All he has to do it beat a nut ,Santorum ,and he can not put him away. They are taking turns saying stupid things. The party can not offer these guys up in the final election unless they drop them off onto an island when one gets the nod. Staying home this primary makes sense. The oil companies and financial pros will crank the cost of gas up, regardless of what damage it does to the economy. Bush's work was unfinished.

Not so sure. What does he offer? That 'business' experience stuff is b/s. It's not relevant. These are different jobs. In business when you're the boss people do what you say. When you're President only your staff does what you say (usually) and there are 535 other little kings who think they know more about it than you do and will tell you where to shove it at every opportunity.

The only problem with nominating Rick Santorum is that we would be one Obama gaffe away from a Santorum presidency. It is a fine balance between putting up somebody unelectable and putting up somebody who shouldn't be elected even in the worst case scenario. I think I'd prefer a Romney presidency to a Santorum presidency, even though I would prefer many others over Romney. The idea of a Santorum/Obama race would have me waking up every morning shaking as I go to check the news and hope that Obama hasn't said something wrong.

I think it would be hard to lose a general election to a man who outright opposes sexual freedom, the right to privacy, and separation of church and state... But these are not ideas that I'd like to take a chance on. At least Romney just seems to be the representative of corrupt business as usual.

Worse. The party nominee sets a tone for the entire ticket. If Santorum wins, Republican candidates for other offices (governor, federal and state legislatures) will adopt his rhetoric and positions. Some of those candidates will inevitably win. And that makes the country and the place you live worse.

Vote for the best candidate, not the one you think will be easily defeated.

Yeah, I'm just paranoid about Obama finding a way to screw it up. He is a great campaigner, but we have an entire media machine experienced in spinning Obama's actions. Fox News may not be well respected as a news source on the internet, but it is easily the most popular news source in the US.

It's not that Obama is likely to screw up, it's that economic pressure will act as concrete shoes. Gas prices soaring will be a downer, and Obama won't really accomplish anything this year because of the election.

Actually he has been accomplishing a decent amount via executive orders and direct requests from private companies. Recent relevant example: As part of his "Consumer Protection Bill of Rights" movement the administration got Google and Microsoft to agree to place consumer tracking opt-outs in their browsers (Firefox already has a feature that fulfills the requests). Here's an article talking about a few more of the changes he has been stretching to make, such as shifting the focus and funding of deportation to those with criminal records, raising fuel economy standards, and placing a hold on the Keystone XL pipeline until safety/route issues could be worked out.

This has been a pretty busy year for his administration, because anything that cannot be done directly by the executive branch isn't getting done. Obama this year has been trying a strategy of executive orders and asking companies nicely for simple reforms because the reforms would be impossible to put through congress in a binding way.

He has also been using the tried and true strategy of making politically unstoppable proposals based on his agenda. Hiring tax incentives? Congress won't allow that, the Republicans have invested too much in the failure of the economy! Hiring tax incentives for veterans? You might as well start shooting puppies on the evening news if you vote against it.

How about the fact that nominating a purposely shitty candidate only further deteriorates democracy? It's not like democrats are so wonderful that we should work to destroy the only short term alternative....

I want Santorum in the public spotlight for as long as possible, so people can become acquainted with the ugly face of the modern Republican party. Then maybe conservatives can figure out how fucked they are and come back to fucking reality already.

Santorum is doing well with Republican primary voters who, as a group, are quite a world apart from general election voters.

He is anathema to independent and moderate voters. While I agree I do not want to see Santorum get the nomination, it's not because I worry about him winning...because he simply cannot. I don't want him winning because I want this nation to have the best two candidates possible. And since Huntsman is out of the race, that leaves Mitt.

Would I handpick Obama or Romney to be our leader? Hell no, but that's reality.

Political nub here. Never voted for a primary, have voted for President and Governor. I thought I read I didn't need to register as democrat or republican to vote in this primary. Am I mistaken? Really trying to reduce Santorum's odds of getting in the office, but I don't affiliate with a party.

It depends, different states have different types of primaries with different rules. If you are voting in Michigan today you can vote regardless of the party stated in your voter registration. If you're in Arizona it's a closed primary and only Republicans (although someone above said they registered Libertarian and were allowed to vote in AZ today) can vote in the primary. If you are in a different state with an upcoming vote most states have information on the website of their Secretary of State that will let you know what primary rules apply. You can also find your voter information, including your selected party, and the location of your designated polling place.

This is ignorant, he absolutely could beat Obama. Gas is predicted to hit $6 already, that alone lowers Obama's favorability significantly; I think 1% loss per 50cent increase is the standard. Obama makes one mistake and it's possible for him to lose. Furthermore a Rick win makes a brokeraged convention more plausible, allowing someone like Rubio who is much more likable to slip in and take the nomination. Don't be dumb.

I voted today, and the usual bullshit for students. My permanent address is in my hometown, I had an on-campus address at one of the dorms during the last presidential election (when I registered to vote), and they let me vote after filling out a change of address form for my off-campus apartment now (in the same city). Do I need to be concerned with anything re: my permanent address on my driver's license, my status as a dependent to my parents, etc?

I am in AZ and I would not vote for Santorum for any reason EVER! I loathe the man with every atom in my body, right down to the fucking nucleus. Fuck that man, fuck him straight to his non-existant hell.

I have never seen so many TV ads nor received so many robo phone calls in my life. This is a nasty campaign and both Repubs will suffer damage for what they are dping. How can Romney or Santorum quietly fall in back of the other one after the campaign.? Romney,s fumbling to make himself look like a regular guy is hurting him badly. ' I have friends who own NASCAR teams' ,did not ingratiate him to fans. The bad part is he thought it would. He is so far out of touch that he is blowing a sure thing.I got robos from Democratic groups urging a vote for Santorum to derail Romney. No need. Romney is doing a fine job of that by himself. His wife is getting embarrassed by his gaffes. She suggested that she should make speeches and comments while he sits in the background.

Live in Michigan. Ron Paul was at State yesterday and the auditorium he was at was filled to capacity. 4000 plus the people waiting outside. Was amazing to see and me and all my friends just went to vote for him. Ron Paul 2012

Voting for Santorum is cutting off your nose to spite your face. The party nominee sets the tone for the entire ticket, all the way down to local races. Republicans will win some of those races. This will destroy a hell of a lot more than the Republican brand.

In the sense that you have to declare which party's primary you'll be voting in, and that your selection will be a public record, yes. However, Michigan doesn't have any actual registration requirements, so it'd be possible for a Democrat to vote in the Republican presidential primary by showing up and declaring that they'd like to vote in the Republican primary.

I voted this morning, they said, check a box, republican or democrat and they handed me a ballot with a different color text printed on it... that's all it took. It did not require me to be registered beforehand for either party and I am NOT registered for either.

I don't think Santorum will be able to undo his crazy if he ends up winning the nomination. His entire political career has been built on the kind of fundamentalism that has its devoted followers but struggles to appeal to the mainstream.

Romney is more mainstream, and he will certainly try to un-take some of the hard-right positions he's been forced to take to fend off Santorum. But I think his bigger problem is that nobody likes him. This is why we've seen an endless array of alternatives paraded out - Trump, Perry, Gingrich, Santorum - each to spend several weeks as the favorite until people realize that they're even worse.

I think Romney will win the nomination because he's the only GOP candidate with money, field organization, and a lack of crippling personal issues. But when he faces off against Obama in the general election - who also has a clean personal record, money, and field organization, and who knows how to appear likeable to most people, he's toast.

You've got Newt Gingrich who cheated on his first wife when she got diagnosed with cancer, divorced her and married the woman he cheated on her with, and then divorced her when she got sick and married the woman he cheated on her with... but tried to impeach Bill Clinton for one blowjob.

Ron Paul has done plenty to give him the title of "Asshole" as well. He's the one who said that Texas should be free to ban sodomy. He's the one that introduced a bill that said the courts shouldn't be able to hear questions on the constitutionality of gay marriage bans.

Actually, from what I understand plenty of adult women and even young girls were abused by priests too, probably nuns as well, but they don't grab headlines like little boys getting banged by Father McPedobear.

I, for one, will be voting for Rick Santorum. The only Republican that has a chance to beat Obama is really Romney, and if Santorum gets the Republican nomination, its a shoo-in for another 4 years for Obama.